


Another Skyline Disappears

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-17
Updated: 2006-08-17
Packaged: 2018-09-15 10:07:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9230210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: Dean watches Sam walk away again, and wonders if he'll ever get used to it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to leadensky for betaing, and to mousapelli, amberlynne, and laurificus for handholding. All remaining errors are mine. TItle from Tom McRae.

i.

New Orleans in the aftermath is a feast for things that feed on the dead, on the living, on fear, on chaos. One big all-you-can-eat buffet for the undead, and Dean is busy from dusk until dawn, killing and burning and salting the earth. He sleeps for a few hours each morning (too hot to sleep for long in the un-air-conditioned trailer, with too many mosquitoes trying to eat him alive), spends the afternoons working construction for money (can't scam or steal here--that'd make him just another ghoul feeding on people's misery, and it's not like there's anything left worth taking, anyway), and gets back to work at night, killing, salting, burning.

It's a living.

He doesn't have time to think about anything else, and he likes it that way.

*

ii.

The morning Dad leaves is like any other morning. They don't talk much. Amid the sound of forks clinking on plates and coffee being swallowed, Dad writes in his journal and Dean reads the paper. He always turns to the sports pages when he's done with the obituaries. Dean's a lifelong Cubs fan ( _always root for the underdog, Sammy_ ), so reading about the White Sox in the Series is no fun, and he doesn't really care about the Astros. He drops the paper onto the table with a dissatisfied grunt.

Dad looks up from his journal. "Everything all right?"

"Fine."

"Dean--"

Dean grins. "I wonder who the White Sox had to make a deal with to even get into the Series." Dad snorts. "I mean, the Red Sox--that was righteous, a curse finally broken, victory for the underdog. But the _White Sox_?" He tsks in disapproval, and Dad's short bark of laughter is enough to warm him in ways that coffee never will.

"Got bigger things to worry about than baseball."

Dean freezes for a moment, mug held to his mouth, coffee lapping at his lips, but he doesn't drink.

_"Got bigger things to worry about than baseball, Dean."_

_"I know, Dad, but--"_

_"Not that I'm not proud of you, son, but there's no way Sam and I can do this without you."_

_"I know."_  
  
Dean puts the mug down on the Formica table with a precise click, eyes the coffee rippling around inside it so he doesn't have to look at his father. "I know," he says. "I know."

*

iii.

They stand awkwardly in the parking lot, and Dean wonders where their normal ease went, and how he can get it back.

"You know where I'll be if you need me," Dad says as he gets into his truck.

Dean nods, hands shoved in his pockets. "You gonna stop in Palo Alto?"

"On the way back, if there's time." Dad adjusts his rearview mirror, skims his fingers over the steering wheel. "Be careful, Dean."

Dean grins again, a reflex, and it comes out cocky even when he doesn't feel that way. "Always am."

He watches, squinting into the sun, until the truck disappears down the road.

Time to get to work.

*

iv.

Dad's radio silence doesn't start to bother Dean until the end of the second week. He's still in New Orleans, still putting in days and nights, more time in one place than he's spent in years, but he likes the rhythm of it, and he likes to be needed. There will be other people to rebuild the city, but not many who can keep it safe the way he does, and here of all places, people are aware of what's lurking in the dark. If things were different, he could see himself spending time here off the hunt, taking a couple weeks' vacation and relaxing for the first time in years.

But there's no vacation, no relaxing, not with Dad missing and Sam two thousand miles away.

He pulls out on a bright morning, taste of chicory on his lips, Metallica blaring from the speakers, heading west.

*

v.

He's delayed a day in Austin by some restless ghosts, spends a couple more in Phoenix, hunting an incubus. He still hasn't heard from Dad, and now he's got an itch in the back of his skull telling him something's wrong, he should go get Sam. He's been a hunter long enough to listen, and he's been alone long enough to act.

Dad's voicemail is the confirmation he doesn't need of suspicions he doesn't want. He speeds up the coast, trying to ignore the knot of dread twisting his stomach. He's not sure what's nagging at him more--Dad's message, or what Sam's reaction will be when he shows up at his door.

It's late when he pulls up in front of Sam's building, and he takes several deep breaths, steeling himself, because as much as he'd like to believe Sam will come if he says, _Dad's in trouble and he needs our help_ , he knows Sam will fight him. It's not like he doesn't understand.

Another deep breath, a quick check in the mirror ( _big smiles, Dean,_ and the memory of a camera flash instead of the reflection of headlights in the darkness), and he leaves the Impala for the unknown and possibly hostile territory of Sam's apartment.

*

vi.

As they drive back to Palo Alto, Sam is silent, dozing. Dean knows he needs his sleep if he's set on this interview in the morning, but he doesn't stop talking. If a small, selfish part of him doesn't want Sam to do well, he quashes it immediately.

"Of course you're gonna knock 'em dead, Sammy," he murmurs. "Not literally. Well. That'd be a damn interesting interview if you had to, wouldn't it? But I don't think they make you whup undead ass to get into law school, do they?" He glances at Sam, head tipped against the window, eyes closed, face half-shadowed. "They'd have to be crazy not to grab you while they can." Sam is still silent except for the whoosh of his breathing, but he smiles, and Dean knows he heard.

It's still dark when he pulls up in front of the apartment building, but it's late enough to have tipped over into early. He knows Sam's had enough rest to manage the interview, even if he looks a little frayed around the edges. He'll clean up just fine. He always does.

Dean watches him walk away again, and wonders if he'll ever get used to it.

*

vii.

On the road, they settle into a routine. They argue and they hunt and they argue some more, and Dean keeps watch over Sam, same as he's always done. He thinks it's working for them, thinks they make a good team--a great team, even, now that Sam isn't fifteen and tripping over his own feet anymore--and he thinks Sam is starting to come around.

And then Dad calls.

This should be a good thing, but Sam goes all drama queen again.

"All right, look," Dean says, "I know how you feel."

"Do you?" Sam demands, and Dean stares at him, shocked. "How old were you when Mom died? Four? Jess died six months ago. How the hell would you know how I feel?"

Dean's hands tighten into fists, skin going white over his knuckles; he's forgotten how cruel Sam can be, how he knows all Dean's weak spots and can slip the knife in without even trying when he wants something and Dean's the one in his way. Dean forces himself to stay calm.

"Dad said it wasn't safe. For any of us. I mean, he obviously knows something that we don't, so if he says to stay away, we stay away."

It's not enough, of course. Even as he says it, he knows it won't be.

Sam slams out of the car, starts taking his stuff out of the trunk, and when Dean barks, "Hey, I'm taking off. I will leave your ass, you hear me?" he's thinking, _Don't go. It's not safe. I can't protect you if you're not here._

But Sam only hears what he says, not what he means.

In the rearview mirror, he watches Sam recede into the distance, and though he's the one driving away, he knows he's not the one leaving.

*

viii.

He fumes the rest of the way to Burkitsville, and he blames himself, because Sam is who he's always been, who Dean's always encouraged him to be, and Dean can't blame him for that. He doesn't know--Dean doesn't _want_ him to know--that he's not the only one who ever wanted to leave.

The job is harder without Sam to charm people into talking (and damn, he's gotten used to having Sam around), but Dean does his recon, starts to figure out what's going on.

After his run-in with the scarecrow, he dials Sam's number, and hopes he answers.

*

ix.

He's not surprised when the doctor gives him the news. He thinks it's kind of funny, really, that he's survived all these years of hunting only to die of a heart attack. He's never thought of his heart as a weak spot before. At least, not like this. Not for another forty years, at least, forty years he never expected to have.

At least he took that fucker out before he electrocuted himself.

He gets out of bed against the nurses' instructions, washes his face and brushes his teeth, and then stares at himself in the mirror. Man, talk about looking like death warmed over. No wonder the nurses won't give him the time of day, even though he's dying.

All of his things are in order. He's got a safe deposit box in a bank in Chicago, even updated it after he 'died' in St. Louis. Everything he has--the Impala, his autographed Ryne Sandberg rookie card, and his tape collection--goes to Sam.

"I don't want it," Sam says when he tells him.

"Don't be an idiot."

"You're not going to die, Dean. I won't let you." He keeps repeating it, as if that'll make it true. It's making Dean tired.

He leans his head against the window, which is cool against his clammy skin, and closes his eyes. "Everybody dies sometime, Sammy."

"Not you. Not on my watch." Now Sam is starting to sound like Dad, which scares Dean in ways he didn't think was possible.

"You should have just left my ass in--"

"Would you shut up? Just _shut up_." Sam pounds the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. "I'm not leaving. You're not dying. We're going to Nebraska and we're fixing this."

And the thing is, when Sam gets that look in his eye, Dean almost believes he will.

*

x.

Dean can hear machines beeping, a sharp counterpoint to the beat of his heart, which sounds heavy and loud to his ears, like the bass line in "The God That Failed." Beneath the beat, there is a low rumble of voices he can't make out, speaking words like, _coma_ and _vegetable_ and _miracle_. They don't say the words he needs to hear, words like, _Sam_ and _Dad_ and _safe_.

He wants to open his eyes, open his mouth, to ask, but he can't do anything except sink back down into the inexorable beat of his heart and the dark red world behind his eyelids.

The next time he's aware of his surroundings, he can feel long fingers twined with his, squeezing tight enough to hurt. He remembers the last time Sam let him hold his hand. He was fourteen and Sam was not-quite-ten, and they'd cut out of school to go to Opening Day at Wrigley Field. It was Greg Maddux's first game back as a Brave, and it was exciting, in the way baseball is exciting, which is a way mellower kind of excitement than they were used to.

They got separated when they were leaving the stadium, and in the sixty seconds Sam was out of his sight, Dean thought he would die a thousand times (and then a thousand more when Dad found out and killed him). When he found Sam again, he grabbed his hand and held on all the way home. They were late for weapons training, and he dragged Sam up the last few streets toward the apartment at a dead run, Sam complaining about the stitch in his side because he hadn't gotten the hang of breathing yet.

Dad had punished them both by taking away television privileges and giving them extra PT for a week. After that, Sam was too old and Dean was too cool, so they didn't anymore, even when Dean thought it might be safer, except when some ritual called for it. Dean didn't think that counted.

"Dean. Please. Don't leave." The voice is familiar, important-- _Sam_ \--and he wants to laugh, needs to answer. He thinks that voice could call him back from the grave. He thinks it probably has.

His eyelids flutter open and to his left, he can see Sam leaning over him, clinging to his hand. To his right he can see his father, looking older and wearier than he's ever been before, sitting in a wheelchair.

"Hey," he whispers, voice rusty from his long silence. Sam offers him a sip of water. He can see tears in their eyes, and he wants to tell them not to worry about him. They never have to worry about him.

He's never the one who leaves.

end

**Author's Note:**

> All of the dialogue in section vii. comes directly from the episode "Scarecrow."


End file.
